Given the glut of biopics that have emerged from Hollywood in recent years, it is surprising that a character as captivating as Edie Sedgwick has been ignored for so long. Of course, Andy Warhol’s Factory crowd has been considered before in Basquiat and I Shot Andy Warhol amongst others, but Sienna Miller’s Sedgwick makes a far more compelling subject than the graffiti artist or the feminist Valerie Solanas. Perhaps it is fitting that Sedgwick has only just been afforded the biopic treatment, given society’s incessant fascination with the cult of celebrity. Sedgwick is referred to as a “poor little rich girl”, a tragic figure, a 1960’s manifestation of a Kate Moss or Paris Hilton, yet George Hickenlooper’s examination of her rapid rise and fall, from Warhol’s muse to washed out drug addict proves to be both mesmerizing and frustrating in equal measure.
crash/burn 